NOT THE WICKED CHILD

4/23/2026

In Sarah Hurwitz’s new book, As a Jew, Michelle Obama’s former speechwriter describes her journey into a newfound interest in learning about, and embracing, her Jewish identity.Sarah grew up as a secular Jew who, while proud of her Judaism, did not feel connected to the traditions of Judaism.

She felt that many of the rituals and customs were silly, and that she, as a successful young American woman, wanted no part in them. 

When participating in the Passover Seder, Sarah always felt she was the wicked child described in the Haggadah, the child who says they want no part in the tradition, the one who excludes themselves from the observances of the family and the community. 

But one day, Sarah writes, she realized that she was not the wicked child.

The wicked child knows about the religion and chooses to dismiss it. The wicked child is learned and informed, and chooses to disassociate.

But Sarah was none of this.

While she was educated and brilliant, her Jewish knowledge was close to naught.

She was not the wicked child, she realized. She was the simple child, or perhaps the uninitiated child, the one so uninformed about her Judaism that she did not even know what to ask.

And this painful realization sent Sarah on a multi-year journey of learning about the richness of Judaism and the beauty of its traditions, a journey she profoundly documents and teaches about in her new book. 

I am thinking about Sarah’s words today because we are now in the seven-week period between Passover and Shavuot. 

Passover is the holiday on which we became a people. 

Before that we were slaves and had no identity of our own. And before we were slaves, we were just a small family of seventy people. Only at the Exodus did we finally become a people of our own. 

Passover is therefore appropriately referred to in Jewish tradition as the birth of the Jewish people. 

But while the Exodus from Egypt was the birth of our people, we did not yet have a Jewish identity. 

The only identity we had was that we were emancipated, that we were no longer slaves. 

But who were these emancipated people? What did they stand for? 

Nobody knew yet. We did not know either. We were free, but we had not yet developed a character.

Shavuot, seven weeks later, is when this free people found its identity. 

Weeks after leaving Egypt, our ancestors stood at the foot of Mount Sinai, where Moses received the Torah from G-d. 

It was there in the desert, amid thunder and lightning, that this newly emancipated people became the people of the book, the people entrusted with the Five Books of Moses, to study them, to observe their laws, to celebrate their teachings, and to share their light with the world. 

We are fortunate that the calendar gives us seven weeks between Passover and Shavuot. 

At the first holiday we think about what it means to be free. 

At the second holiday we think about what it means to have an identity. 

And in the weeks in between, we study and learn about that identity, so that we can become informed, educated, and knowledgeable about the rich inheritance we have been given. 

They tell a story about a nonbeliever who approached the Rogatchover Gaon, a brilliant sage known for his sharp tongue.

The nonbeliever said:

“Rabbi, I am a heretic.”

To which the sage replied:

“No, my dear. You are an ignoramus.”

A heretic, Sarah Hurwitz discovered, is one who is informed and learned about Jewish faith and still chooses not to engage.The first step in our Jewish journey, whether we then choose to embrace it or not, is to learn, to study, and to become more knowledgeable about our Jewish faith and identity.

And the odds are that once we do, we will love it so much and never turn back.